Many in the government performance world will tell you that performance management is an art. Recently, the increased access to large scale performance information is driving the belief that performance management is a science.

Earlier in the morning, Federal Drive’s Tom Temin asked John Desenberg of the Performance Institute whether performance management is an art or a science. Robert Behn, lecturer in public policy at the Harvard Kennedy School, is firmly in the art camp.

When it comes to improving agency performance, sometimes you have to bring in the perspective of the money people. If budgets and goals aren’t aligned, it’s pretty hard to move things along. It gets harder when two or more agencies are involved with the same goal. Doug Glenn, the Interior Department’s deputy chief financial officer, has got some ideas on interagency collaboration and coordination.

Federal employees are mostly knowledge workers. Every program comes with rules, regulations, procedures and best practices. For leaders, managing all the knowledge in people’s heads presents an important challenge.

Everyone knows that successful organizations are functional organizations. But creating that functionality while combating ever constant miscommunication or lack of motivation can be a struggle. Bethany Blakey, a performance manager at The Performance Institute, is the featured luncheon speaker on the second day of the Government Performance Summit. In her presentation, she plans to demonstrate specific techniques and tools to successfully build results.